It's a promising start. The styling of the page you can do by virtue of the platform is like 10x better than most mud clients I've seen.
There are some weird rendering issues when transitioning from create account –> confirmation –> login on Chrome 11.0.696.68/Windows; it seems like half or a quarter of the previous dialog is rendered for a split second before transitioning to the next dialog/screen. Anyone else see that?
It may be this effect. Was it not rendering that correctly?
After some valid feedback from users visiting the development demo I've included guiders and visual cues for players logging in for the first time. I'll update the guiders as new features and ui are added.
A few major updates. Added sound support (and mute button) (streaming, preloading, caching) for bgm and custom events. (sword swing, level up, boss battle, etc). Added layered grid system on the client side for future expansions. (playing area, board games, etc) Added persisting toolbar (top right corner). Added input form auto-complete and suggestions for commands.
2. For some reason I can't get passed the "Actors are taking the stage" part and it eventually reports "Socket closed." Any ideas on what I've missed? When your server was up, I was able to create a character so it's not my browser. I'm assuming it's DB or permissions related?
3. On the iPad, the text field at the bottom isn't displaying properly so I can't send commands to the server.
Thanks for the I.E. report. I've had no way of testing for I.E. at all. I'll look into the comma issues.
The database should automatically migrate. I wouldn't expect it to be a database issue if you're able to run the game at all at this point.
Could you elaborate on exactly what you did to install haikumud and the operating system you've done it on? Also your version of ruby would be helpful.
re ipad: Thanks for this report, too. It may be wise to eventually detect user agent to make an attempt to better serve devices like the ipad. Am I correct in assuming you were able to get through the login-process in your ipad? Or was this from testing on my live server?
I've kept checking and I think it might be an issue with my hosts WebSocket implementation (lack of it/port) I'm following this up with them. I'll let you know how I go.
On the iPad, I encountered the error on your server. I haven't managed to get to the login page on my server yet.
Installation was taking a copy of your source, then I grabbed your index file off your server. Copied /public into my root public_html directory and your index file. /server /js etc. are all copied in the root.
I'm trying it on a basic (cheap!) Linux webhost, I don't have any further system info yet. If I continue to have trouble once I have WebSocket sorted out, I'll grab that off them too.
I've kept checking and I think it might be an issue with my hosts WebSocket implementation (lack of it/port) I'm following this up with them. I'll let you know how I go.
On the iPad, I encountered the error on your server. I haven't managed to get to the login page on my server yet.
Installation was taking a copy of your source, then I grabbed your index file off your server. Copied /public into my root public_html directory and your index file. /server /js etc. are all copied in the root.
I'm trying it on a basic (cheap!) Linux webhost, I don't have any further system info yet. If I continue to have trouble once I have WebSocket sorted out, I'll grab that off them too.
This would be your problem. You've only got some of the application installed. I'm not sure a webhost like this is enough. The web site component of the application is actually very small. This is more like an application serving a site than a pure webpage and you're going to need administration privs to install it. I would suggest something like linode or another virtual server host. (I'm using linode with ubuntu 10.04 LTS and OSX 10.6 for testing. Windows untested.) The way you should be installing it is (probably) with git. Once git is installed you can command line this:
After this step you will have the full file structure that's required. Next you must install ruby (1.9.1+ pref). I highly suggest using rvm to do it and manage your installations. The prebuilt binaries are hit or miss right now. Once it's installed correctly (and I admit it can be a pain right now with some linux distros) you can install the bundler gem.
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gem install bundler
With this installed if you go to the app directory you do:
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bundle install
And it will automatically install the dependency gems.
In my experience yesterday I had to get openssl, sqlite3 adapter (since that's default database type), and maybe some other system libraries installed as well. It was a little unobvious but if you google search the errors you get along the way it usually will come up with an answer for the exact library you need per your distro.
Once it's correctly installed you go into the app directory and type
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ruby server.rb
The server will start up and the webpage at the port specified will come available.
Buh, feeling a little stupid now. Have asked my host for VPS pricing before I jump ship… If there's some sort of referral program with linode, post the link as I wouldn't have signed up with them if it wasnt for your system.
Updates include persistant world model, better support for tile based graphics, and google chrome frame.
The persistant world model ensures the state of the game is saved even when the game is down. Game state never changes to a "default". If this is desired it must be set at boot. Examples include quest state, items on the ground, health pools, combat state, or player location in the world.
The tile based graphics for the grid use pure html to layer the images on top of each other. Better support for animated sprites and tiles in general as well. I.e. you can have a tile of grass that sways, or water that is animated. Sprites state is as you'd expect from 2d RPGs. Walking, taking damage, swinging sword, etc etc are all valid animations.
This is an update I'm excited about. The google chrome frame brings good internet explorer support through an one click installation. Google Chrome Frame It turns the IE renderer into webkit just for sites that ask for GCF to be used. It's a better solution for me than trying to get internet explorer working natively, since Internet Explorer is terrible.
I took a few weeks off on the project but I'm back in full swing. :)
Oh, and if any windows users want to help me out direct your internet explorer to haikumud.com and check it out. Then reply on this thread and tell me what parts of the experience could be better for you.
Please include the version of internet explorer as well. That information is in help/about internet explorer. I'm testing on VWfusion internet explorer 8.
Updates include a new structure for tile based representation. Chat message integration into the database. Walls and collision detection even between adjacent tiles. New sound effect packet. New packets (mv and new) for updating/creating new nodes in the viewing port rather than reconstructing it when an update is required.
I think the new tile based representation is particularly clever because it shares the DOM with the html renderer. No special structure required. It both models the game data as well as the viewing port.
The chat message integration was inevitable. It's not enough, imo, to just log stuff to a text file. It needs to be searchable and persistant in the database so that if you log in your scroll-back should already include the conversation taking place before you entered the game. Right now there's no concept of anything but public messages so there is little privacy concern. There will be future consideration for the protocol surrounding private messaging wrt privacy.
Thanks for all the windows folks who came by yesterday and left information. I'm pleased to report that with GCF coverage of internet explorer 6, 7, 8, and 9 was confirmed.
Hey, don't know if youre still working on it but I'm away from home and attempting to get in with my iPad and it wont go past the actors stage (won't bring up login screen). Thought you'd like to know if it was something to do with the changes you've made.
Ignore me if you're still working on it…
Can't wait to get home and take a look at it and integrate with mine.
There are some weird rendering issues when transitioning from create account –> confirmation –> login on Chrome 11.0.696.68/Windows; it seems like half or a quarter of the previous dialog is rendered for a split second before transitioning to the next dialog/screen. Anyone else see that?
It may be this effect. Was it not rendering that correctly?